Editing Cybele (section)

=== Festivals and cults ===

====Megalesia in April====
{{Main|Megalesia}}
[[File:Chronography of 354 Mensis Aprilis.png|thumb|upright|Illustration of the month of April based on the [[Calendar of Filocalus]] (354 AD), perhaps either a Gallus or a theatrical performer for the Megalesia<ref>Michele Renee Salzman, ''On Roman Time: The Codex Calendar of 354 and the Rhythms of Urban Life in Late Antiquity'' (University of California Press, 1990), pp. 83–91, rejecting the scholarly tradition that the image represents an old man in an unknown rite for Venus</ref>]]
The ''Megalesia'' festival to Magna Mater commenced on April 4, the anniversary of her arrival in Rome. The festival structure is unclear, but it included [[ludi scaenici]] (plays and other entertainments based on religious themes), probably performed on the deeply stepped approach to her temple; some of the plays were commissioned from well-known playwrights. On April 10, her image was taken in public procession to the [[Circus Maximus]], and [[chariot race]]s were held there in her honour; a statue of Magna Mater was permanently sited on the racetrack's dividing barrier, showing the goddess seated on a lion's back.<ref>It was probably copied from a Greek original; the same appears on the [[Pergamon Altar]]. See {{harvnb|Roller|1999|page=315}}.</ref>

Roman bystanders seem to have perceived Megalesia as either characteristically "[[Glossary of ancient Roman religion#ritus graecus|Greek]]";<ref>In the late Republican era, [[Cicero]] describes the hymns and ritual characteristics of Megalensia as Greek. See Takacs, in {{harvnb|Lane|1996|page=373}}.</ref> or Phrygian. At the cusp of Rome's transition to Empire, the Greek [[Dionysius of Halicarnassus]] describes this procession as wild Phrygian "mummery" and "fabulous clap-trap", in contrast to the Megalesian sacrifices and games, carried out in what he admires as a dignified "traditional Roman" manner; Dionysius also applauds the wisdom of Roman religious law, which forbids the participation of any Roman citizen in the procession, and in the goddess's [[Greco-Roman mysteries|mysteries]];<ref>Dionysius_of_Halicarnassus, ''Roman Antiquities'', trans. Cary, Loeb, 1935, [https://penelope.uchicago.edu/Thayer/E/Roman/Texts/Dionysius_of_Halicarnassus/2A*.html 2, 19, 3 – 5.] See also commentary in {{harvnb|Roller|1999|page=293}} and note 39: "... one can see how a Phrygian [priest] in an elaborately embroidered robe might have clashed noticeably with the plain, largely monochromatic Roman tunic and toga"; cf Augustus's "efforts to stress the white toga as the proper dress for Romans."</ref> Slaves are forbidden to witness any of this.<ref>{{harvnb|Roller|1999|page=296}}, citing Cicero,  ''De Haruspicum Responsis'', 13. 28.</ref> In the late republican era, [[Lucretius]] vividly describes the procession's armed "war dancers" in their three-plumed helmets, clashing their shields together, bronze on bronze,<ref>Recalling the Kouretes and Corybantes of Cybele's Greek myths and cults.</ref> "delighted by blood"; yellow-robed, long-haired, perfumed Galli waving their knives, wild music of thrumming tympanons and shrill flutes. Along the route, rose petals are scattered, and clouds of incense arise.<ref>See Robertson, N., in {{harvnb|Lane|1996|pages=292–293}}. See also Summers, K., in {{harvnb|Lane|1996|pages=341, 347–349}}.</ref> The goddess's sculpted image wears the Mural Crown and is seated within a sculpted, lion-drawn chariot, carried high on a bier.<ref>Summers, in {{harvnb|Lane|1996|pages=348–350}}.</ref> The Roman display of Cybele's Megalesia procession as an exotic, privileged public pageant offers signal contrast to what is known of the private, socially inclusive Phrygian-Greek mysteries on which it was based.{{sfn|Roller|1999|page=317}}

===='Holy week' in March====
{{See also|Hilaria}}
The [[Principate]] brought the development of an extended festival or "holy week"<ref>Maria Grazia Lancellotti, ''Attis, Between Myth and History: King, Priest, and God'' (Brill, 2002), p. 81; [[Bertrand Lançon]], ''Rome in Late Antiquity'' (Routledge, 2001), p. 91; Philippe Borgeaud, ''Mother of the Gods: From Cybele to the Virgin Mary'', translated by Lysa Hochroth (Johns Hopkins University Press, 2004), pp. 51, 90, 123, 164.</ref> for Cybele and Attis in March (Latin ''[[Martius (month)|Martius]])'', from the [[Ides (calendar)|Ides]] to nearly the end of the month. Citizens and freedmen were allowed limited forms of participation in rites pertaining to Attis, through their membership of two [[Collegium (ancient Rome)|colleges]], each dedicated to a specific task; the ''Cannophores'' ("reed bearers") and the ''Dendrophores'' ("tree bearers").<ref>Duncan Fishwick, "The Cannophori and the March Festival of Magna Mater", ''Transactions and Proceedings of the American Philological Association'', Vol. 97, (1966), p. 195 [https://www.jstor.org/stable/2936006] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20161202192925/https://www.jstor.org/stable/2936006|date=2016-12-02}}</ref>

* March 15 (Ides): ''Canna intrat'' ("The Reed enters"), marking the birth of Attis and his exposure in the reeds along the Phrygian river [[Sakarya River|Sangarius]],<ref>[[Tertullian]], ''Adversus Iudaeos'' 8; [[Lactantius]], ''De Mortibus Persecutorum'' 2.1; Gary Forsythe, ''Time in Roman Religion: One Thousand Years of Religious History'' (Routledge, 2012), p. 88; Lancellotti, ''Attis, Between Myth and History'', p. 81.</ref> where he was discovered—depending on the version—by either shepherds or Cybele herself.<ref>Michele Renee Salzman, ''On Roman Time: The Codex Calendar of 354 and the Rhythms of Urban Life in Late Antiquity'' (University of California Press, 1990), p. 166.</ref> The reed was gathered and carried by the ''cannophores''.<ref>Duncan Fishwick, "The Cannophori and the March Festival of Magna Mater", ''Transactions and Proceedings of the American Philological Association'', Vol. 97, (1966), p. 195.</ref>
* March 22: ''Arbor intrat'' ("The Tree enters"), commemorating the death of Attis under a pine tree. The ''dendrophores'' ("tree bearers") cut down a tree,{{sfn|Alvar|2008|pages=288–289}} suspended from it an image of Attis,<ref>[[Firmicus Maternus]], ''De errore profanarum religionum'', 27.1; Rabun Taylor, "Roman Oscilla: An Assessment", ''RES: Anthropology and Aesthetics'' 48 (Autumn 2005), p. 97.</ref> and carried it to the temple with lamentations. The day was formalized as part of the official Roman calendar under Claudius.<ref>[[John Lydus]], ''De Mensibus'' 4.59; [[Suetonius]], ''Otho'' 8.3; Forsythe, ''Time in Roman Religion,'' p. 88.</ref> A three-day period of mourning followed.<ref>Forsythe, ''Time in Roman Religion,'' p. 88.</ref> [[File:9595 - Milano - Museo archeologico - Patera di Parabiago - Foto Giovanni Dall'Orto 13 Mar 2012.jpg|thumb|Cybele and [[Attis]] (seated right, with [[Phrygian cap]] and [[shepherd's crook]]) in a chariot drawn by four lions, surrounded by dancing Corybantes (detail from the [[Parabiago plate]]; embossed silver, {{circa|200}}–400 AD, found in [[Mediolanum|Milan]], now at the [[Archaeological Museum of Milan]])]]
* March 23: on the [[Tubilustrium]], an archaic holiday to [[Mars (mythology)|Mars]], the tree was laid to rest at the temple of the Magna Mater, with the traditional beating of the shields by Mars' priests the [[Salii]] and the lustration of the trumpets perhaps assimilated to the noisy music of the Corybantes.<ref>Salzman, ''On Roman Time,'' pp. 166–167.</ref>
* March 24: ''Sanguem'' or ''Dies Sanguinis'' ("Day of Blood"), a frenzy of mourning when the devotees whipped themselves to sprinkle the altars and effigy of Attis with their own blood; some performed the self-castrations of the Galli. The "sacred night" followed, with Attis placed in his ritual tomb.<ref>Salzman, ''On Roman Time,'' p. 167; Lancellotti, ''Attis, Between Myth and History'', p. 82.</ref>
* March 25 ([[March equinox|vernal equinox]] on the Roman calendar): ''[[Hilaria]]'' ("Rejoicing"), when Attis was reborn.<ref>Macrobius, ''Saturnalia'' 1.21.10; Forsythe, ''Time in Roman Religion,'' p. 88.</ref> Some early Christian sources associate this day with the [[resurrection of Jesus]].<ref>[[Tertullian]], ''Adversus Iudaeos'' 8; [[Lactantius]], ''De Mortibus Persecutorum'' 2.1; Forsythe, ''Time in Roman Religion,'' p. 88; Salzman, ''On Roman Time,'' p. 168.</ref> [[Damascius]] attributed a "liberation from Hades" to the Hilaria.<ref>Damascius, ''Vita Isidori excerpta a Photio Bibl. (Cod. 242),'' edition of R. Henry (Paris, 1971), p. 131; Salzman, ''On Roman Time,'' p. 168.</ref>
* March 26: ''Requietio'' ("Day of Rest").<ref>Salzman, ''On Roman Time,'' p. 167.</ref>
* March 27: ''Lavatio'' ("Washing"), noted by [[Ovid]] and probably an innovation under Augustus,<ref name="alvar2867">{{harvnb|Alvar|2008|pages=286–287}}</ref> Literary references indicate that the ''lavatio'' was "well established" by the [[Flavian dynasty|Flavian period]]; <ref>Forsythe, ''Time in Roman Religion'', p. 89.</ref> when Cybele's sacred stone was taken in procession from the Palatine temple to the [[Porta Capena]] and down the [[Appian Way]] to the stream called [[Almone|Almo]], a [[tributary]] of the [[Tiber]]. There the stone and sacred iron implements were bathed "in the Phrygian manner" by a red-robed priest. The ''quindecimviri'' attended. The return trip was made by torchlight, with much rejoicing. The ceremony alluded to, but did not reenact, Cybele's original reception in the city, and seems not to have involved Attis.<ref name="alvar2867"/>
* March 28: ''Initium Caiani'', sometimes interpreted as initiations into the mysteries of the Magna Mater and Attis at the [[Gaianum]], near the Phrygianum sanctuary at the [[Vatican Hill]].<ref>Salzman, ''On Roman Time,'' pp. 165, 167. Lawrence Richardson, ''A New Topographical Dictionary of Ancient Rome'' (Johns Hopkins University Press, 1992), p. 180, suggests that ''Initium Caiani'' might instead refer to the "entry of Gaius" ([[Caligula]]) into Rome on March 28, 37 AD, when he was acclaimed as ''[[princeps]]''. The Gaianum was a track used by Caligula for chariot exercises. Salzman (p. 169) sees the Gaianum as a site alternative to the Phrygianum, access to which would have been obstructed in the 4th century by the construction of [[Old St. Peter's Basilica|St. Peter's]].</ref>

Scholars are divided as to whether the entire series was more or less put into place under Claudius,<ref>Forsythe, ''Time in Roman Religion,'' p. 88, noting [[Jérôme Carcopino]] as the chief proponent of this view.</ref> or whether the festival grew over time.{{sfn|Alvar|2008|page=286}} The Phrygian character of the cult would have appealed to the Julio-Claudians as an expression of their claim to Trojan ancestry.<ref>Forsythe, ''Time in Roman Religion,'' pp. 89–92.</ref> It may be that Claudius established observances mourning the death of Attis, before he had acquired his full significance as a resurrected god of rebirth, expressed by rejoicing at the later ''Canna intrat'' and by the Hilaria.<ref>Duncan Fishwick, "The Cannophori and the March Festival of Magna Mater", ''Transactions of the American Philological Association'' 97 (1966), p. 202.</ref> The full sequence at any rate is thought to have been official in the time of [[Antoninus Pius]] (reigned 138–161), but among extant ''[[List of ancient Roman fasti|fasti]]'' appears only in the [[Calendar of Philocalus]] (354 AD).<ref>Forsythe, ''Time in Roman Religion,'' p. 88</ref><ref name="alvar2867"/>

====Minor cults====
Significant anniversaries, stations, and participants in the 204 arrival of the goddess – including her ship, which would have been thought a sacred object – may have been marked from the beginning by minor, local, or private rites and festivals at Ostia, Rome, and [[Victoria (mythology)|Victoria's temple]]. Cults to Claudia Quinta are likely, particularly in the Imperial era.{{sfn|Roller|1999|page=314}} Rome seems to have introduced evergreen cones (pine or fir) to Cybele's iconography, based at least partly on Rome's "Trojan ancestor" myth, in which the goddess gave Aeneas her sacred tree for shipbuilding. The evergreen cones probably symbolised Attis' death and rebirth.{{sfn|Roller|1999|page=279}}<ref>Takacs, in {{harvnb|Lane|1996|page=373}}.</ref> Despite the archaeological evidence of early cult to Attis at Cybele's Palatine precinct, no surviving Roman literary or epigraphic source mentions him until [[Catullus]], whose poem 63 places him squarely within Magna Mater's mythology, as the hapless leader and prototype of her Galli.<ref>Summers, K., in {{harvnb|Lane|1996|pages=377 ff.}}; for Catullus, see Takacs, in {{harvnb|Lane|1996|pages=367 ff.}}. For online Latin text and English translation of Catullus's poem 63, see [https://www.vroma.org/~hwalker/VRomaCatullus/063.html vroma.org] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20140528114911/https://www.vroma.org/~hwalker/VRomaCatullus/063.html |date=2014-05-28 }}</ref>

====Taurobolium and Criobolium====
[[File:Lyon-Autel-CIL-XIII-1756.jpg|thumb|upright|Eroded inscription from [[Lugdunum]] (modern [[Lyon]], in France) commemorating a taurobolium for the Mother of the Gods under the title ''Augusta''<ref>''Taurobolium Matris Deum Augustae'': ''[[Corpus Inscriptionum Latinarum|CIL]]'' 13.1756.</ref>]]
[[File:CIL XIII 1752.jpg|thumb|upright|Inscription set up by the dendrophores of Lugdunum for the wellbeing of the emperor, his ''[[numen]]'', and his divine household, marking a taurobolium; the presence of an ''[[archigallus]]'' is noted<ref>''CIL'' 13.1752.</ref>]]
Rome's strictures against castration and citizen participation in Magna Mater's cult limited both the number and kind of her initiates. From the 160s AD, citizens who sought initiation to her mysteries could offer either of two forms of bloody animal sacrifice – and sometimes both – as lawful substitutes for self-castration. The [[Taurobolium]] sacrificed a bull, the most potent and costly [[Glossary of ancient Roman religion#victima|victim]] in Roman religion; the [[Criobolium]] used a lesser victim, usually a ram.<ref>See {{harvnb|Duthoy|1969|page=1 ff.}} Possible Greek precursors for the taurobolium are attested around 150 BC in Asia Minor, including [[Pergamum]], and at Ilium (the traditional site of ancient [[Troy]]), which some Romans assumed as their own and Cybele's "native" city. The form of taurobolium presented by later Roman sources probably developed over time, and was not unique to Magna Mater – one was given at [[Puteoli]] in 134 AD to honour [[Venus (mythology)|Venus]] Caelestia (C.I.L. X.1596) – but anti-pagan polemic represents it as hers. Some scholarship defines the Criobolium as a rite of Attis; but some dedication slabs show the bull's garlanded head (Taurobolium) with a ram's (Criobolium), and no mention of Attis.</ref><ref>See also Vecihi Özkay, "The Shaft Monuments and the 'Taurobolium' among the Phrygians", ''Anatolian Studies'', Vol. 47, (1997), pp. 89–103, British Institute at Ankara, for speculation that some Phrygian shaft monuments anticipate the Taurobolium pit.</ref>

A late, melodramatic and antagonistic account by the Christian apologist [[Prudentius]] has a priest stand in a pit beneath a slatted wooden floor; his assistants or junior priests dispatch a bull, using a sacred spear. The priest emerges from the pit, drenched with the bull's blood, to the applause of the gathered spectators. This description of a Taurobolium as blood-bath is, if accurate, an exception to usual Roman sacrificial practice;<ref>Prudentius is the sole original source for this version of a Taurobolium. Beard, p. 172, referring to it; "[this is] quite contrary to the practice of traditional civic sacrifice in Rome, in which the blood was carefully collected and the officiant never sullied." {{harvnb|Duthoy|1969|page=1 ff.}}, believes that in early versions of these sacrifices, the animal's blood may have simply have been collected in a vessel; and that this was elaborated into what Prudentius more-or-less accurately describes. {{harvnb|Cameron|2010|page=163}}, outright rejects Prudentius' testimony as anti-pagan hearsay, sheer fabrication, and polemical embroidery of an ordinary bull-sacrifice.</ref> it may have been no more than a bull sacrifice in which the blood was carefully collected and offered to the deity, along with its organs of generation, the testicles.<ref>{{harvnb|Cameron|2010|page=163 cf.}}, the self-castration of Attis and the Galli.</ref>

The Taurobolium and Criobolium are not tied to any particular date or festival, but probably draw on the same theological principles as the life, death, and rebirth cycle of the March "holy week". The celebrant personally and symbolically took the place of Attis, and like him was cleansed, renewed or, in emerging from the pit or tomb, "reborn".{{sfn|Duthoy|1969|page=119}} These regenerative effects were thought to fade over time, but they could be renewed by further sacrifice. Some dedications transfer the regenerative power of the sacrifice to non-participants, including [[Imperial cult (ancient Rome)|emperors, the Imperial family and the Roman state]]; some mark a [[Glossary of ancient Roman religion#dies natalis|''dies natalis'']] (birthday or anniversary) for the participant or recipient. Dedicants and participants could be male or female.<ref>{{harvnb|Duthoy|1969|page=61 ff., 107, 101-104, 115}} Some Taurobolium and Criobolium markers show a repetition between several years and more than two decades after.</ref>

The sheer expense of the Taurobolium ensured that its initiates were from Rome's highest class, and even the lesser offering of a Criobolium would have been beyond the means of the poor. Among the Roman masses, there is evidence of private devotion to Attis, but virtually none for initiations to Magna Mater's cult.<ref>Fear, in {{harvnb|Lane|1996|pages=41, 45}}.</ref>

In the religious revivalism of the later Imperial era, Magna Mater's notable initiates included the deeply religious, wealthy, and erudite [[praetorian prefect]] [[Vettius Agorius Praetextatus|Praetextatus]]; the [[Quindecimviri sacris faciundis|quindecimvir]] [[Gaius Caeionius Rufius Volusianus|Volusianus]], who was twice consul; and possibly the [[Julian the Apostate|Emperor Julian]].{{sfn|Duthoy|1969|page=1}} Taurobolium dedications to Magna Mater tend to be more common in the Empire's western provinces than elsewhere, attested by inscriptions in (among others) Rome and [[Ostia Antica|Ostia]] in Italy, [[Lugdunum]] in Gaul, and [[Carthage]] in Africa.<ref>{{harvnb|Duthoy|1969|page=1 ff.}} (listing the relevant inscriptions).</ref>